Electrical component testing in general, and capacitor testing in particular, may be important elements of a quality control program related to manufacturing electrical devices. Component testing in general can increase an electrical device's overall reliability by identifying components that are defective, improperly installed or that have parameters that fall outside of design specifications. Increasing product reliability can, in turn, reduce manufacturing costs that might otherwise be incurred in processing returns and in rework. The importance of component testing grows as electrical devices grow in complexity, and as components shrink in size.
Capacitor testing in particular may be important because many electrical device problems may be caused by defective or misplaced capacitors. Functional testing of an electrical device may not identify defective or misplaced capacitors. However, testing that includes measuring capacitance of individual capacitors may identify defective and misplaced capacitors. Consider, as an example, an electrical device that requires a capacitor with a particular capacitance value in order to properly decouple a proximately placed semiconductor device. An electrical device including an out-of-specification capacitor may pass functional testing before it leaves the manufacturer's facility, but the electrical device may fail intermittently in the field because of the out-of-specification capacitor. Capacitor testing that measures that capacitance values of capacitors may identify the out-of-specification capacitor before the electrical device leaves the manufacturer's facility, possibly eliminating a field failure, a return and rework costs.